1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a disc player for reading out and reproducing information signals recorded on an information disc, such as an optical disc, and for displaying the read out and reproduced information signals on a display section, and a loading device whereby the information disc, such as an optical disc, on a disc table, in which both a disc proper and a disc cartridge comprised of a disc and a cartridge accommodating the disc therein may be loaded on the disc table.
2. Description of the Prior Art
An optical disc has so far been used as a recording medium for recording musical sound information signals, image information signals or the like information signals.
The optical disc is comprised of a base plate of a synthetic resin, such as a transparent polycarbonate resin, a recording layer formed on the base plate, and a layer of a transparent synthetic resin formed on the recording layer. Such optical disc exhibits sufficient mechanical strength as compared with the magnetic disc or the like formed by a film sheet as the base material. The recording layer covered by the synthetic resin exhibits sufficient durability against dust and dirt. Thus the so-called compact disc, which is an optical disc on which musical sound signals or the like are recorded, is handled as a disc per se, and loaded by itself on a disc player.
On the optical disc, information signals are recorded at a higher recording density. The information signals may be rewritten on certain types of optical discs, or with magneto-optical discs operating under the photomagnetic effects. With this type of disc, deposition of only a small amount of dust and dirt on the signal recording surface results in dropout in recording or reproduction of the information signals so as to render it impossible to maintain satisfactory recording and/or reproducing characteristics.
For this reason, this type of optical disc is accommodated in a main cartridge body and loaded in this state on the disc player.
Meanwhile, the disc player or the like apparatus in which the optical disc per se is used as the recording medium is designed so that only the disc per se may be loaded, whereas the disc player in which the disc cartridge comprised of a main cartridge body and an optical disc accommodated therein is used as the recording medium is designed so that only the disc cartridge may be loaded, while the disc proper cannot be loaded.
In a disc player in which the optical disc is used as the recording medium, it is desirable to enable information signals recorded on at least a plurality of optical discs types to be read out and reproduced through standardization of the recording formats for these different optical discs.
On the other hand, it is also tried to develop a disc player for which both the optical disc proper or the disc cartridge may be used as the recording medium.
The above described disc player of the type in which information signals such as Japanese language dictionary data or the English-Japanese dictionary data are recorded on the optical disc, and desired data are read out from the disc so as to be displayed on the display section, is currently in use.
Such disc player is constituted by a disc drive unit adapted for rotating an information disc such as an optical disc on which the predetermined information is recorded, and reading out and reproducing the information recorded on the disc, a keyboard device for selecting the desired information to be read and reproduced from the information recorded on the disc, and a display device for displaying the information read out from the disc as, for example, the letter or character information.
Meanwhile, the conventional disc reproducing apparatus is constituted by a disc drive device, a keyboard device and a display device, these being separate devices put together and used as a desk type unit. The devices making up the disc reproducing apparatus tend to be bulky in size and hence cannot be adapted as portable devices.
On the other hand, by reason of the drastically improved recording density in the information disc, such as the optical disc, the information corresponding to a voluminous Japanese language dictionary or English-Japanese dictionary may now be recorded on an optical disc which is 8 cm in diameter.
Thus there is a demand for an apparatus whereby the small-sized optical disc on which the information signals have been recorded at a high recording density may be transported and the desired information may be read out and reproduced easily at a desired place so as to be displayed as the visual information on the display device.